Setting the facts straight

Wednesday

Apr 9, 2014 at 2:00 AM

To the Editor:

To the Editor:

In these complex, perilous times fear and ignorance often ignite the search for scapegoats. John Harrigan, in his recent letter to the editor, has found his to assign blame for the police station/connector road fiasco — Messrs. Nowell and Macdonald. While even the most benighted soul has a right to their opinions, they do not have a right to their own facts, which in this case are as follows:

1) Nowell and Macdonald cannot be responsible for even 1 percent of the delays here as they have never won a single vote on the issues. Tough to wield the power attributed to us when you are always on the short end of the stick.

2) The actual cause of the delays runs the gamut from: not owning part of the land for the projects to contractor "error" which led to massive placement of fill in wetlands and subsequent violation of the conditions of State DEP and Army Corps of Engineer permits; the destruction of drainage buffers along the western end of the road; destruction of a State and Federally protected vernal pool; failure of the citizenry to finance the previously unbudgeted traffic signal at Route 1; and the "unauthorized" clear cutting of up to 7 acres of forest land, among other problems.

3) To state, as Mr. Harrigan does, that the placement of the road at the bottom of a blind hill a few hundred feet from another unsignaled road (the Wild Kingdom) demonstrates ignorance of the real world conditions already in existence. Lower speed will do little by itself for this chaotic road arrangement.

4) However, speed is a major contributor to the overall unsafe conditions on this stretch of Route 1. In early March, the Board of Selectmen held a televised 8:30 a.m. work session with Steve Landry, Chief Traffic Engineer for the Maine Depart of Transportation. Mr. Harrigan's scapegoats, having long lobbied for such a meeting, were able to extract from MDOT a promise of a traffic safety study to be done under summer traffic conditions. Prudence indicates a wait-for-the-safety-study-data approach before committing to the dual road scheme, as the safety study just might indicate that one raod is, as common sense would indicate, much safer.

5) As a long term proponent of a police station project, I made my motion to separate the road from the building so that the project would not get bogged down by the dubious road.

6) My motion to poll the voters as to which road configuration they preferred was for an advisory vote, non-binding. I make no apologies for attempting to poll the voters who will pay for all the above shenanigans and ought to be able to weigh in on the road issue.

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